Litecoin founder on the 51% attack problem

Litecoin creator Charlie Lee: “If a crypto can’t be 51% attacked, it is permissioned and centralized”…

Over the past day or two, the Ethereum Classic network has come under pressure, amidst suggestions that it’s been on the receiving end of a 51% attack. That is, that somebody has seized control of 51% of its blockchain, and has manipulated it as a consequence (with double spends being alleged).

The full story of that is something we’ve analysed in this story here. But one cryptocurrency figure has added his twopenneth to the conversation.

Charlie Lee is best known for being the creator of Litecoin, and he’s taken to his Twitter feed to share his views on the matter. Responding to a statement that “if it can’t be 51% attacked, it isn’t decentralized”, Lee noted in a Tweet that “this is a thought-provoking observation”.

“By definition, a decentralized cryptocurrency must be susceptible to 51% attacks whether by hashrate, stake, and/or other permissionlessly-acquirable resources”, he argued. “If a crypto can’t be 51% attacked, it is permissioned and centralized”.

This followed an earlier post, where he’d caution his Twitter followers to be careful with coins “that are not dominant in their respective mining algorithm”.

For Ethereum Classic’s part, it’s been asking exchanges and pool operations to increase block confirmation times as it gets to the bottom of just what happened over the past few days. “We are making no attempt to hide or downplay recent events”, it posted, and you can find its Twitter feed, with its latest updates, right here.